“Because a critical mass of people can surprise you: over 70,000 decision-makers and social change actors are in town. There really has never been more peer pressure for social change, showing the world scalable solutions to the world’s most pressing problems. And right here, on the peninsula outcropping between Copacabana and Ipanema beaches, Skoll and our close partners AVINA, Ashoka and the Fundaçao Roberto Marinho, are hosting the 3 day Forum on Social Entrepreneurship and the New Economy. It’s one of the most public events at Rio+20, celebrated on national TV in Brazil and included in Rio+20 agendas. Social entrepreneurship is front and center…”

All – 100% – will go to a clean water project like a well or a filtering system. If we reach our big goal of $2000, we will bring clean drinking water to 100 people. Clean water to drink, and not for one day either. Every day. As they say, “Water changes everything.”

I know it sounds silly, but ever since I read the novel Dune, I’ve been fascinated by the idea of a planet– our planet– without water. I’m a sci-fi fan. When clean drinking water becomes so rare and so precious, what does that look like? Who owns the water?

The big event of 2012 is this June at Rio+20, the UN Conference on Sustainable Development, where:

“World leaders along with thousands of participants from the private sector, NGOs and other groups will come together to shape how we can reduce poverty, advance social equity and ensure environmental protection on an ever more crowded planet,” according to the conference’s Secretary General, Sha Zukang.

The thematic focus for the event is the green economy, poverty alleviation, and global policies for sustainable development.

From the Poverty Matters blog: Famine isn’t an “anomaly”, but the predictable result of a broken–and complex– system of food production and distribution. Hunger, of course, is not just a problem limited to Africa or elsewhere in the developing world, but a global challenge.